Thinking of putting up second fence

You damn right it's cause he is French lol
Yea thats an Option but i dont like shrubs too much.
but thats definately and option. Honestly if it wasn't for of the middle
maintenance of 2 fences this would be option number 1 for sure lol
joeway
wrote:

Quebec
maybe
Yeah, that must be it. Or, maybe you being the English conqueror, you feel
you have the right to dictate what colour fence he has.. You got a free
fence out of the deal, now learn how to live in peace with your neighbours.

If you can get by losing a few feet of usable yard there,you might
consider planting some evergreens in front of that fence. If you do it
yourself it probably would cost about the same or less than a
professionally erected second fence.
That's what I did last year when my next door neighbor's contractors put
in a functional but very messy looking "rock facing" that I had to look
at ... but my neighbor didn't. See:
http://home.comcast.net/~jwisnia18/jeff/mmiv.html
As I was finishing up my digging and planting, the neighbor came over
and insisted on paying for the evergreens. I told him it would be
hypocritical of me to take his money because I have always said that as
far as "looks" go my rights end at my property line and that if I don't
like what I see it's my job to screen it out.
He persisted in offering, so I let him write a nice check to a worthy
local charity we support and everyone felt good.
It's a year later and those evergreens are almost touching each other
now and have increased enough in height so they effectively block off
our view of that mess.
Hope you can work something out too.
Jeff

He needs help now. Maybe he can get this guy to buy his new fence for
him at the employee discount. Yes, OP, you won't be able to complain
anymore, but you'll probably save a lot of money. (Although get prices
elsewhere and at his place as if you weren't getting a discount, so
you'll know if and how much you are.)
He doesn't really *need* help, but this is the one and maybe the only
thing the next door neigbhor can do for the OP that will really
benefit the OP and won't cost the neighbor anything, I would think.

Meirman
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Cool.
Yes, and it looks stupid. When they find out you put up the second
one, you'll look stupid.

If there is no HOA, yes. And even if there is a HOA, he doesn't have
to use your preferred color, unless his is against the rules.

How are you going to mow the lawn between the two?

So you are at war with him. You're just diplomatic when you see him
in person. Diplomacy is war by other means.

Anyone who works for a fence company knows what kind of fence he wants
before he even sees his next house, and certainly as soon as he sees
it. He doesn't have to wait to move in to know.
I've seen quite a few townhouses or doubles (side by side duplexes)
where they were originally built the same, but they put roofs on
separately, in different colors even, they put different siding on, or
paint the entire house different colors. That's worse than a fence.
(Is this fence in the front yard or back?)
In fact, that's the reason townhouses now are built with all adjecent
houses different colors. Because when n'hhood were all the same
color, the neighbors would on purpose or for laziness paint or trim
with different colors. So some would be the same and some would be
different and it looked terrible. Now they are all different, so it
doesn't look bad when a given pair doesn't match.
So far my strip is ok, with everything russet brown, but at the top of
the hill, where it was supposed to be harvest gold or something, a
half a dozen people bought paint without finding out where they were
supposed to buy it, got the wrong colors, and that strip looks
terrible. I sort of like it better when the houses are all the same
color, but having them all different colors is insurance against what
happened at the top of my hill.

If I were in his shoes, I wouldn't want black. (Actually my preferred
finish is no finish, and that's all that's permitted where I live. I
should have checked in advance that that was a rule, but I did notice
at least that any fences were unfinished. I wouldn't even have a
fence but I'm at the end of a group, and everyone took shortcuts
across my yard when the previous owner owned it. He put in the fence,
but I probably would have too.
Meirman
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Now whoever decided to make the houses different in the first place is very
wise. Makes a livable plan that allows for human beings, exhibiting actual
human behavior, to live together. It's the approach that everyone is supposed
to be lock-step that doesn't work.
(And what the Sam Hill is the horribly worng thing with differentiating two
attached houses in the first place??)

I think they look worse when first built than it does when all the
houses are the same color scheme. (mine have light brown, smooth
brick for the first floor, and russet brown t1-11 for the "privacy
fence, and the second floor, and the door trims on the first floor,
and the front door. One of the reasons I bought it was that I thought
it was pretty. These are townhouses.
I think when every house is different, it doesn't look good.
Here each building includes 8 townhouses, and they are in 4 groups of
two. That is, the elevlation of the houses changes as the building
goes up a hill, and the setback changes a foot or two, but only groups
of two, 1-2, 3-4, 5-6, 7-8, are always the same elevation and the same
setback. They always share a roof. I think it looks terrible when
two of them can't agree and they each put on a roof, that's a
different color (apparently the HOA has no rules about roof color.)
In NYC and downtown Baltimore, the brownstones or row houses don't
come in pairs. And in a couple cases, I've seen them put on stone
siding on a brownstone while the rest of the block is still
brownstone. It looks terrible. In Baltimore, they call it formstone
(I think it was invented here) and it is very popular, but it still
looks bad when a block looks OX0XXX0XX where X is either the original
finish and O is formstone or the other way around.

Various versions of yellow, gold, and something I can't name that was
meant to match the original color, that all clash with each other.
Plus it was a poor choice of color in the first place, because there
is no aluminum or vinyl siding made in any color like it. (Actually,
only 2/3rd of the houses at the top of the hill are that color. I
think that row, with the 1/3 that is brown, was the first row built.
All the rest are brown.

Meirman
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This all sounds very nice, but that houses should be netral colors like that,
and that houses (even built-same townhouse duplexes) should all match is a
matter of taste.

Your opinion.
A couple of stories:
I'm old enough to recall how the rows of built-same and painted (almost) same
Cape Cods built in Levittown, NY,right after WWII were held up as awful examples
of the Sameness of American Suburbia. Pictures of the matched rows, each with a
car in the driveway, would be plastered up as example of a social malaise that
was supposedly symptomatic of alienation of American culture. I don't subscribe
to all that, of course - decrying the (as it turns out, very temporary) sameness
as some Big Evul is just as silly IMO as blaming the lady on the corner who
painted her house pink for the downfall of the neighborhood. But, if you go
down those same streets now, what with different replacement sidings and
windows, dormers, and additions, Levittown is far from an example of stifling
sameness! And IMO it certainly doesn't look bad, nor would it look better if
they all chose the same vinyl siding limited to Beige, Sand, or Clay.
Folks who bought old Victorians and strive to restore the house to the original
condition and colors. They *think* they'll find the original color was
something on the order of - white with grey trim and touches of, maybe, deep
rose, find in the archives that their house in 1900 was purple, red, with deep
blue items of trim! Or something like that...
So this is really a matter of taste. *Why* is a set of marching houses, up the
hill, all biege brick with russett brown T1-11 supposed to be such of such
aesthetic superiority over yellow, gold, and what other variety would be decided
upon by other townhouse owners?
Surely that photo of houses on Telegraph Hill in San Fransisco that is so often
used would be left in some archive if all those houses were matching beige with
russet brown!
Banty

True. which might make this whole subthread moot -- I don't remember.
It might make this post moot too. :)

Neither do I but maybe for a different reason from yours. AFAIK, the
only way they could have built homes cheap enough that most of those
people could have bought one was by making them the same. It may take
a while to build the first house, and the second, but I bet it took
much less to build the ones that followed. (the particular issue here,
I don't know about, if they were the same color or not. I don't think
changing colors would be bad with free-standing houses, and it
wouldn't slow them down or wasted money much either, I think, except
for those partly used cans of paint at the very end. :) )

When I lived in Brooklyn, I made a point to go see Levittown, Long
Island, just because of its fame. I went in 1980 or so.
I too noted that almost all had additions and bushes, and trees iirc.
I sort of wondered how the 5% of people with no changes 30 years
later felt. :)

The proof is in the pudding. I think if you would see this row, you
too would think it was bad. Maybe if I had a digital camera, I would
post pictures.
It's not about the individuality of the owner**. It's about 2 or 3
adjacent and proximate colors clashing. I think everyone agrees
that's possible. **In fact, it was their attempts to use the same
color, but not finding it, that caused this problem. Originally, we
all knew what company, Duron, sold the paint that matched, and what
the two colors were called. But I think no one told these people**,
and they did the best they could to match, and didn't. The brown has
become unavailable twice iirc in the past 26 years, but there is a
substitute name that seems to be the same color or at least doesn't
clash. But brown is used a lot of places so there are always a lot of
browns. This one, when they don't make it, they don't make anything
close enough. That won't stop a clerk from suggesting something,
though. He doesn't know there is another house a half inch away.
**I think no one told them they would get 10?% off if they said they
lived in this n'hood either. Easy enough to arrange, but most
homeowners wouldn't think of it if not told.
One house is sort of carrot yellow, a combination of light carrot and
the original color it seems, and another particularly clashing one I
can't remember. Each color would probably look ok if they were
farther from the others.

Arent' those free standing houses? Anyhow, they're not like my top
row (which fortunately I don't have to drive by to get in and out. :)
)

Meirman
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Oh sure, that they were all the same made them more affordable. Heck, the
McMansions around here all pretty much are the same (OK, different options, and
this one is stucco, that one is vinyl siding, but really, they're the SAME.)
IIRC the Levittown houses were all painted in one of four pastels.
But even the sameness is a matter of taste. All of a sudden the chic thing is
to restore a Sears catalog bungalow. Imagine - mail-order houses all the rage
if they're old enough (I do like them, BTW).

But wait - remember the Sears calatlog bungalow! Having kept the original stuff
is now a value booster. I'm even told I shoudln't trash my barely-working 1960
cooktop and built-in oven - they're "vintage" eBay fodder.

Maybe I would. After all, the original colors sound nice. But I dont' think
they should have to be on every house.

That's one of the pitfalls of defining colors. Why even have to search for ones
that "at least don't clash"? In 40 years, you'll see a sea of
sorta-mostly-matching motley looking shades of russet brown. Bleahh.
Better to set up some contrast from the get go.
Banty (OK, carrot-yellow does sound pretty crappy...)

Maybe they're right. I woudl start advertising in ebay before the new
ones went in. That way if no one bites, you won't have a spare oven
and stovetop around. If the price it sells for is really high, maybe
you can spend more moeny on your new stuff.
OTOH, timing your purchase that way is hard to coordinate with sales
on the new stuff.
Meirman
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I was supposed to move out when I got married and had kids. Otherwise
I like it here. At the rate I'm going, I'll be hear until I die,
which is planned for 40 years from now, as you say, when I'm 98. I
hope it doesn't look terrible, because by the time I'm 90, I won't
have the energy to pack, let alone put all the features in my new
place that I put in this one.
Meirman
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